As citizens of the world grow more and more frustrated at the state of play particularly around the climate crisis and biodiversity loss, the masses continue to become accustomed to living in a world where many of us have the ability to voice our opinions on social problems in the online world, communicate with loved ones on the other side of the planet, and have an open book (though made of metal instead of paper) to a never ending quantity of resources to educate yourself on anything you want to learn.
Environmental data has seen leaps and bounds of improvement as new technology and innovation supported by the technology have allowed us to collect better data and information than ever before.
Here are some eye opening statistics and information to consider how much change has occurred over the past 30 years in regards to technology and data use.
About 20 years ago, the internet was still a baby, and dial up modems and landlines were still often a necessity for even connecting to the internet. The “acceptable” connection was 1 or 1.5Mb/s (Now the average speed of home broadband is 63.3Mb/s). Email was likely only accessible by logging in remotely to your corporate office-based email server. In today’s world, you can’t get away from your email. If you didn’t login to your account on your laptop, don’t worry, I’m sure your mobile device, apple watch, or Fitbit will be sure to let you know about those items you still need to buy in “your basket” from that shop you scrolled through the other day (and had no intention of buying anything from).
Now there are around 4.3 Billion active email users across the globe (2022) and the number of emails sent every second exceeds 3 million.
The drive to go into the office to use the computers is the same argument for why more and more workers fight to work from home; why commute to the office to use the same the technology you have at home?*
If you don’t use email as a primary mechanism for communication at work or school, other networks have the ability to connect people such as teams, google meets, and zoom. All of which were heavily utilised during the Covid-19 pandemic so the world didn’t literally come crashing to a halt.
Needless to say, the developments in technology have been staggering in the timescale in which they have occurred and have brought great strides in innovation BUT now it’s time to think about the impacts.
*Acknowledging that this isn’t the only reason but that conversation is for a different article.
Data
All of the activities mentioned above take data. But what is data? If you’re anything like me, you may have never stopped to query what this really means other than knowing you need it to function in today’s society.
What is it?
“Data” in computing, is information that can be interpreted and used by computers. It is a collection of facts, such as numbers, words, measurements, observations or even just descriptions of things. In computing, this is typically stored electronically vis a vis your files and databases on your computer.
“Data Use” means the access, storage, transfer, and/or transformation of data through contribution, consumption, or computation. This includes tasks such as sending emails and making complex mathematical equations.
But, we need data centres for us to use data. These are buildings or campuses with powerful computers used to run companies services. If you’re using google, streaming on Youtube, or asking your google nest what the weather is, these queries will go through a data centre. And data centres holding and transferring data between locations, has a significant ecological footprint.
“Everything on the internet, every link you click, every video you watch, is physically stored in a datacentre somewhere.”
Electricity + Carbon + Water + Land
In large economies (The US, EU, UK, China etc.), data centres account for about 2-4% of total electricity consumption within their respective borders.
Looking at the image below, you can image how much electricity is needed to keep one room of a data centre running for a day. A single data centre can consume the equivalent electricity of 50,000 homes. Beyond the electricity consumption needed, they also need intensive cooling systems which require air conditioning and high water usage.
Air conditioning in these facilities necessitates the burn off of significant amounts of carbon and accounts for as high as 40% of electricity use in these buildings. Another contributor to the cooling of these machines is by water. Chilled water can be piped through the latticework of server racks which provides more effective cooling than air conditioning. Though more efficient than air conditioning, the water usage needed to cool these buildings or campuses of machines is extensive.
Recently, Arizona faced challenges of water security due to increasing occurrence of drought and low water levels persisting in Lake Mead. In 2022, the State published the Arizona Water Security Plan outlining how they will tackle the challenge going forward.
Arizona is also home to a large data centres which utilise extensive amounts of water for their cooling systems. See this 2021 news report to hear the local communities views on an old proposal for an additional data centre to be built in Arizona.
In addition to water use, these data centres also take up a significant amount of land. In Arizona, data centres are attributed to about 1,144,988 sq m of land – that’s about 160 football pitches!
E-Waste and Harmful Metals
Another concerning problem with data centres operations is their need for the latest and most up-to-date materials needed due to never ending technological innovation. The average person will buy a new computer and try to keep it going for at least 3 to 5 years but these data centres need to update their equipment at a much higher rate as old equipment is quickly deemed obsolete.
This constant need for updating systems means that the e-waste footprint of data centres is staggering. Though recycling efforts are made, further thought is needed in implementing an approach that considers equipment lifecycles and ways in which pieces can be reused and deployed in different ways.
Though the thought of all the data we use can feel daunting, there are digital organisations out there trying to do their part to reduce our data footprint where we can.
Organisations and businesses doing wonders
Eco.send’s mission is to eliminate the carbon emissions of email marketing. They are an email marketing platform who reduce and offset the emissions generated from every email marketing campaign sent through them.
Eco.send’s servers are powered by renewable energy sources and they plant trees on behalf of their customers. In 2024, they were the Finalist for the Green Product of the Year at the Sustainability in Tech Awards.
LEAP provides eco web hosting. Their servers use 100% renewable electricity from sources like the sun, wind, and sea. They co-created and signed the sustainable web manifesto, creating a greener web that is good for people and planet. This can be achieved by making all of their online work and activities as clean, efficient, open, honest and regenerative as possible.
Krystal provides web hosting which uses Ecotricity for our power, the first company in the UK to offer true 100% renewable energy. All power consumed at their data centres comes from 100% renewable sources. All centres have achieved a PUE (Power Usage Effectiveness) rating of at least 1.2.
Be curious!
- Want to learn more about data centres, water use, and AI in Arizona, read this The Atlantic article.
- Check out Your Data Diet by reading up on the estimates your daily habits cost in data usage at The Guardian
- Check out Keysource, who provide consultation services which can improve the sustainability practices at data centres.
- Check out our archives to learn more about e-waste.
Featured image by kanawatTH on Canva.
**Please note: This article represents the ideas and thoughts of the author and is not representative of their other affiliations.
